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Amphibians, reptiles, birds and mammals - living and extinct
Darren Naish is a science writer, technical editor and palaeozoologist (affiliated with the University of Portsmouth, UK) who mostly works on Cretaceous dinosaurs and pterosaurs. He also studies such things as the swimming abilities of giraffes and fossil marine reptiles. An avid interest in modern wildlife and conservation has resulted in many adventures in lizard-chasing, bird-watching and litter-collecting. I've been blogging since 2006 and a compilation of early Tet Zoo articles is now available in book form as Tetrapod Zoology Book One. Additional recent books include The Great Dinosaur Discoveries and Dinosaurs Life Size. For more biographical info go here. I can be contacted intermittently at eotyrannus (at) gmail dot com. PLEASE NOTE: I am now completely unable to keep up with email correspondence. I do my best to respond to all queries and requests, but please don't be offended if I fail to reply. I blog from and about conferences - please contact me for more info. Follow me on twitter: @TetZoo.
You've read the blog, now buy the books....
The Great Dinosaur Discoveries (US edition)
Encyclopedia of Dinosaurs and Prehistoric Life
"Walking with Dinosaurs": The Evidence - How Did They Know That?
Dinosaurs of the Isle of Wight (Guide 10; Field Guides to Fossils Series.) (Palaentology FG Fossils)
Tetrapod Zoology
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November 30, 2009
Category: herpetology
After a little delay, it's time to embark once more into the World of Toads!!! Having previously looked at toads in general, and at the toads of Europe, we here continue the series by looking at yet more familiar,...
Posted by Darren Naish at 11:43 AM • 16 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
November 29, 2009
Category: herpetology
Carnivorous animals often die from choking, and field biologists have done a good job of recording many such instances in the literature. This image shows an unlucky young Roadrunner Geococcyx californicus found dead in Brisco County, Texas, in 1998. The...
Posted by Darren Naish at 9:18 AM • 45 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
November 28, 2009
Category: herpetology
Congrats yet again to Sterling Nesbitt and colleagues on the publication of another one of those insane Triassic hellasaurs, this time the surreal archosauriform* Vancleavea campi (Nesbitt et al. 2009) [adjacent life restoration by Sterling Nesbitt]. Vancleavea was named...
Posted by Darren Naish at 8:33 AM • 34 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
November 27, 2009
Category: pterosaurs
Long-time readers will recall my few articles about the Peter Wellnhofer pterosaur meeting [see links below], held at the Bayerische Staatssammlung für Paläontologie und Geologie (Bavarian State Palaeontological Collection - BSPG) in Munich in 2007. The meeting, organised by...
Posted by Darren Naish at 4:57 AM • 10 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
November 25, 2009
Category: mammalogy
I had to scan some hominid pictures today; came across this old classic and thought it worth using here....
Posted by Darren Naish at 6:29 AM • 56 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
November 23, 2009
Category: herpetology
As a Tet Zoo regular you'll know and love the remarkable limbless amphibians known as caecilians. In case you don't know, caecilians have sensory tentacles, sometimes have protrusible eyes, sometimes lack eyes entirely, often exhibit sophisticated parental care [maternal skin-feeding...
Posted by Darren Naish at 8:05 AM • 31 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
November 20, 2009
Category: frivolous nonsense
My good friend Luis Rey was kind enough to pass on the following photos, taken at the Jardin Des Plantes in Paris. It's the extinction carousel, (presumably) the only place in the world where you might ride a sivathere......
Posted by Darren Naish at 5:01 AM • 25 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
November 19, 2009
Category: mammalogy
Time only for a picture-of-the-day post... here are portraits of the big animalivorous microbats Otomops (a molossid, of course*), Cheiromeles (also a molossid) and Vampyrum (a phyllostomid). The pic is from Freeman (1984), but you might notice that two of...
Posted by Darren Naish at 4:23 AM • 32 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
November 17, 2009
Category: herpetology
You've probably seen - presumably on TV - Nile crocs Crocodylus niloticus interacting with Common hippos Hippopotamus amphibius (if you've seen it in real life, lucky you). By and large the two seem to keep apart. Having said that, there...
Posted by Darren Naish at 4:21 AM • 29 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
November 16, 2009
Category: mammalogy
By now you might have read my two previous articles (part I, part II) on the assorted tetrapods I encountered in Libya last month. Here's the third and final part in the series [image below shows chital at left, melanistic...
Posted by Darren Naish at 4:57 AM • 25 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
